Shipments of notebooks reached Apple's expectations in January, and the MacBook maker plans to increase its orders for the first quarter of calendar 2011, providing further evidence that the company is largely unaffected by an Intel chipset design error, according to a new report.

DigiTimesreported Wednesday that Apple's notebook shipments are expected to "remain strong" in the first quarter of 2011. It noted that retail channel vendors indicated a widely publicized design flaw in the chipset accompanying Intel's latest-generation Sandy Bridge processors "did not impact" Apple, and the company is expected to increase orders.

The Mac maker was reportedly aided by the fact that it is slower in upgrading its products to the latest platform. The report said that Apple is still using Intel's Calpella chips for "most" of its current models, allowing it to "completely" avoid the impact.

"The sources pointed out that because Apple's products have high (average selling prices), even if the company is slow in upgrading its products to the latest platform, it will not see a significant impact on its pricing or gross margins," the report said.

"However, for Hewlett-Packard (HP), Acer and Dell, which heavily depend on their economic scale, the new platform will help raise their ASPs and therefore, these makers will try to launch notebooks with new platforms as early as possible."

The report follows an exclusive scoop from AppleInsider published on Tuesday, as people familiar with Apple's plans indicated that the company's new MacBook Pros are in production and on track for release in early March. The company reportedly anticipates an introduction of the new models in about two weeks' time.

Intel disclosed earlier this month that it discovered an error in its series 6 chipsets, dubbed Cougar Point, which causes the performance of serial ATA ports numbered 2 through 5 to degrade over time in extreme conditions. The issue applies to both mobile and desktop processors, and does not affect SATA ports 0 and 1.

Just a week after the error was revealed, Intel announced that it had resumed shipment of chipsets for Sandy Bridge-powered PC system configurations not impacted by the design flaw. The company also said the new, fixed version of its support chip would begin shipping for systems that relied on SATA ports 2 through 5 in mid-February. In addition, the company confirmed it will meet its deadline to begin shipping dual-core Sandy Bridge chips on Feb. 20.

Perhaps I'm dense, but I fail to see how the SB issue would affect MBP sales when the current gen doesn't use SB?

Anyone who was waiting for a SB MBP would hold off until the soon-expected refresh, at which point it is reasonable to assume the SB issue would be resolved. Anyone who was unable to would have to purchase today's MBP - but I suspect this number is statistically insignificant.

Perhaps I'm dense, but I fail to see how the SB issue would affect MBP sales when the current gen doesn't use SB?

Anyone who was waiting for a SB MBP would hold off until the soon-expected refresh, at which point it is reasonable to assume the SB issue would be resolved. Anyone who was unable to would have to purchase today's MBP - but I suspect this number is statistically insignificant.

Anyone care to enlighten me?

It takes time to produce chipsets. If Apple said they don't want any "bad" ones, they'd have to wait for "good" ones which would take quite a bit of time if they want to launch their new MBPs worldwide without causing backorders immediately.

It takes time to produce chipsets. If Apple said they don't want any "bad" ones, they'd have to wait for "good" ones which would take quite a bit of time if they want to launch their new MBPs worldwide without causing backorders immediately.

Thats the point, there arent bad ones for pretty much all notebook and AIO manufacturers needs. There are two perfectly good SATA III ports on the chip chipset Apple can use. This is exactly the number that are used across the board. Maybe its time Apple started using 6Gbps SATA III.

I never noticed until recently, but most of the articles posted on this site only offer one, maybe two new paragraphs and everything else is a recap. Kind of annoying.

I am really looking forward to the new MBP announcement. I'll be ordering one asap.

As stated in a recent post, most of the articles posted on this site only offer one, maybe two new paragraphs and everything else is a recap. It's been asserted that this practice is "kind of annoying."

In forum related news, AppleInsider poster by the name of j1h15233 had this to say about recent rumors, "I am really looking forward to the new MBP announcement. I'll be ordering one asap."

Thats the point, there arent bad ones for pretty much all notebook and AIO manufacturers needs. There are two perfectly good SATA III ports on the chip chipset Apple can use. This is exactly the number that are used across the board. Maybe its time Apple started using 6Gbps SATA III.

Exactly! I've been trying to get people to understand that. The other ports are the older 3GBs SATA ports. Most portables won't need them. In fact, manufacturers have asked Intel to continue delivering them, and so they are.

Perhaps I'm dense, but I fail to see how the SB issue would affect MBP sales when the current gen doesn't use SB?

Anyone who was waiting for a SB MBP would hold off until the soon-expected refresh, at which point it is reasonable to assume the SB issue would be resolved. Anyone who was unable to would have to purchase today's MBP - but I suspect this number is statistically insignificant.

Anyone care to enlighten me?

if you expect a february 15th release date then Foxconn has to build these things and order parts, etc. Intel sprung this a few weeks ago so chances are there were no parts ordered to build current gen MBP's. so there are shortages